M., sitting in the bow window looking out over St James's Street, couldn't care less. He had two weeks' trout4 fishing on the Test to look forward to and, for the other two weeks, he would have sandwiches and coffee at his desk. He rarely used Blades, and then only to entertain important guests. He was not a 'clubable' man and if he had had the choice he would have stuck to The Senior, that greatest of all Services' clubs in the world. But too many people knew him there, and there was too much 'shop' talked. And there were too many former shipmates who would come up and ask him what he had been doing with himself since he retired5. And the lie, 'Got a job with some people called Universal Export,' bored him, and though verifiable, had its risks.
Porterfield hovered6 with the cigars. He bent7 and offered the wide case to M.'s guest. Sir James Molony raised a quizzical eyebrow8. 'I see the Havanas are still coming in.' His hand hesitated. He picked out a Romeo y Julieta, pinched it gently and ran it under his nose. He turned to M. 'What's Universal Export sending Castro in return? Blue Streak9?'
M. was not amused. Porterfield observed that he wasn't. As Chief Petty Officer, he had served under M. in one of his last commands. He said quickly, but not too quickly, 'As a matter of fact, Sir James, the best of the Jamaicans are quite up to the Havanas these days. They've got the outer leaf just right at last.' He closed the glass lid of the case and moved away.
Sir James Molony picked up the piercer the head waiter had left on the table and punctured10 the tip of his cigar with precision. He lit a Swan Vesta and waved its flame to and fro across the tip and sucked gently until he had got the cigar going to his satisfaction. Then he took a sip11, first at his brandy and then at his coffee, and sat back. He observed the corrugated12 brow of his host with affection and irony13. He said, 'All right, my friend. Now tell me. What's the problem?'
M.'s mind was elsewhere. He seemed to be having difficulty getting his pipe going. He said vaguely14, between puffs15, 'What problem?'
Sir James Molony was the greatest neurologist in England. The year before, he had been awarded a Nobel Prize for his now famous Some Psychosomatic Side-effects of Organic Inferiority. He was also nerve specialist by appointment to the Secret Service and, though he was rarely called in, and then only in extremis, the problems he was required to solve intrigued16 him greatly because they were both human and vital to the State. And, since the war, the second qualification was a rare one.
M. turned sideways to his guest and watched the traffic up St James's.
Sir James Molony said, 'My friend, like everybody else, you have certain patterns of behaviour. One of them consists of occasionally asking me to lunch at Blades, stuffing me like a Strasbourg goose, and then letting me in on some ghastly secret and asking me to help you with it. The last time, as I recall, you wanted to find out if I could extract certain information from a foreign diplomat17 by getting him under deep hypnosis without his knowledge. You said it was a last resort. I said I couldn't help you. Two weeks later, I read in the paper that this same diplomat had come to a fatal end by experimenting with the force of gravity from a tenth floor window. The coroner gave an open verdict of the "Fell Or Was Pushed" variety. What song am I to sing for my supper this time?'
Sir James Molony relented. He said with sympathy, 'Come on, M.! Get it off your chest!'
M. looked him coldly in the eye. 'It's 007. I'm getting more and more worried about him.'
'You've read my two reports on his condition. Anything new?'
'No. Just the same. He's going slowly to pieces. Late at the office. Skimps18 his work. Makes mistakes. He's drinking too much and losing a lot of money at one of these new gambling19 clubs. It all adds up to the fact that one of my best men is on the edge of becoming a security risk. Absolutely incredible considering his record.'
Sir James Molony shook his head with conviction. 'It's not in the least incredible. You either don't read my reports or you don't pay enough attention to them. I have said all along that the man is suffering from shock.' Sir James Molony leant forward and pointed20 his cigar at M.'s chest. 'You're a hard man, M. In your job you have to be. But there are some problems, the human ones for instance, that you can't always solve with a rope's end. This is a case in point. Here's this agent of yours, just as tough and brave as I expect you were at his age. He's a bachelor and a confirmed womanizer. Then he suddenly falls in love, partly, I suspect, because this woman was a bird with a wing down and needed his help. It's surprising what soft centres these so-called tough men always have. So he marries her and within a few hours she's shot dead by this super-gangster chap. What was his name?'
'Blofeld,' said M. 'Ernst Stavro Blofeld.'
'All right. And your man got away with nothing worse than a crack on the head. But then he started going to pieces and your MO thought he might have suffered some brain injury and sent him along to me. Nothing wrong with him at all. Nothing physical that is - just shock. He admitted to me that all his zest21 had gone. That he wasn't interested in his job any more, or even in his life. I hear this sort of talk from patients every day. It's a form of psycho-neurosis, and it can grow slowly or suddenly. In your man's case, it was brought on out of the blue by an intolerable life-situation - or one that he found intolerable because he had never encountered it before -the loss of a loved one, aggravated22 in his case by the fact that he blamed himself for her death. Now, my friend, neither you nor I have had to carry such a burden, so we don't know how we would react under it. But I can tell you that it's a hell of a burden to lug23 around. And your man's caving in under it. I thought, and I said so in my report, that his job, its dangers and emergencies and so forth24, would shake him out of it. I've found that one must try and teach people that there's no top limit to disaster - that, so long as breath remains25 in your body, you've got to accept the miseries26 of life. They will often seem infinite, insupportable. They are part of the human condition. Have you tried him on any tough assignments in the last few months?'
'Two,' said M. drearily27. 'He bungled28 them both. On one he nearly got himself killed, and on the other he made a mistake that was dangerous for others. That's another thing that worries me. He didn't make mistakes before. Now suddenly he's become accident-prone.'
'Another symptom of his neurosis. So what are you going to do about it?'
Tire him,' said M. brutally29. 'Just as if he'd been shot to pieces or got some incurable30 disease. I've got no room in his Section for a lame-brain, whatever his past record or whatever excuses you psychologists can find for him. Pension, of course. Honourable31 discharge and all that. Try and find him a job. One of these new security organizations for the banks might take him.' M. looked defensively into the clear blue, comprehending eyes of the famous neurologist. He said, seeking support for his decision, 'You do see my point, Sir James? I'm tightly staffed at Headquarters, and in the field, for that matter. There's just no place where I can tuck away 007 so that he won't cause harm.'
'You'll be losing one of your best men.'
'Used to be. Isn't any longer.'
Sir James Molony sat back. He looked out of the window and puffed32 thoughtfully at his cigar. He liked this man Bond. He had had him as his patient perhaps a dozen times before.
He had seen how the spirit, the reserves in the man, could pull him out of badly damaged conditions that would have broken the normal human being. He knew how a desperate situation would bring out those reserves again, how the will to live would spring up again in a real emergency. He remembered how countless33 neurotic34 patients had disappeared for ever from his consulting-rooms when the last war had broken out. The big worry had driven out the smaller ones, the greater fear the lesser35. He made up his mind. He turned back to M. 'Give him one more chance, M. If it'll help, I'll take the responsibility.'
'What sort of chance are you thinking of?'
'Well now, I don't know much about your line of business, M. And I don't want to. Got enough secrets in my own job to look after. But haven't you got something really sticky, some apparently36 hopeless assignment you can give this man? I don't mean necessarily dangerous, like assassination37 or stealing Russian ciphers38 or whatever. But something that's desperately39 important but apparently impossible. By all means give him a kick in the pants at the same time if you want to, but what he needs most of all is a supreme40 call on his talents, something that'll really make him sweat so that he's simply forced to forget his personal troubles. He's a patriotic41 sort of a chap. Give him something that really matters to his country. It would be easy enough if a war broke out. Nothing like death or glory to take a man out of himself. But can't you dream up something that simply stinks42 of urgency? If you can, give him the job. It might get him right back on the rails. Anyway, give him the chance. Yes?'
The urgent thrill of the red telephone, that had been silent for so many weeks, shot Mary Goodnight out of her seat at the typewriter as if it had been fitted with a cartridge43 ejector. She dashed through into the next room, waited a second to get her breath back and picked up the receiver as if it had been a rattlesnake.
'Yes, sir.'
'No, sir. It's his secretary speaking.' She looked down at her watch, knowing the worst.
'It's most unusual, sir. I don't expect he'll be more than a few minutes. Shall I ask him to call you, sir?'
'Yes, sir.' She put the receiver back on its cradle. She noticed that her hand was trembling. Damn the man! Where the hell was he? She said aloud, 'Oh, James, please hurry.' She walked disconsolately44 back and sat down again at her empty typewriter. She gazed at the grey keys with unseeing eyes and broadcast with all her telepathic strength, 'James! James! M. wants you! M. wants you! M. wants you!' Her heart dropped a beat. The Syncraphone. Perhaps just this once he hadn't forgotten it. She hurried back into his room and tore open the right hand drawer. No! There it was, the little plastic receiver on which he could have been bleeped by the switchboard. The gadget45 that it was mandatory46 for all senior Headquarters staff to carry when they left the building. But for weeks he had been forgetting to carry it, or worse, not caring if he did or didn't. She took it out and slammed it down in the centre of his blotter. 'Oh, damn you! Damn you! Damn you!' she said out loud, and walked back into her room with dragging feet.
The state of your health, the state of the weather, the wonders of nature - these are things that rarely occupy the average man's mind until he reaches the middle thirties. It is only on the threshold of middle-age that you don't take them all for granted, just part of an unremarkable background to more urgent, more interesting things.
Until this year, James Bond had been more or less oblivious47 to all of them. Apart from occasional hangovers, and the mending of physical damage that was merely, for him, the extension of a child falling down and cutting its knee, he had taken good health for granted. The weather? Just a question of whether or not he had to carry a raincoat or put the hood48 up on his Bentley Convertible49. As for birds, bees and flowers, the wonders of nature, it only mattered whether or not they bit or stung, whether they smelled good or bad. But today, on the last day of August, just eight months, as he had reminded himself that morning, since Tracy had died, he sat in Queen Mary's Rose Garden in Regent's Park, and his mind was totally occupied with just these things.
First his health. He felt like hell and knew that he also looked it. For months, without telling anyone, he had tramped Harley Street, Wigmore Street and Wimpole Street looking for any kind of doctor who would make him feel better. He had appealed to specialists, GPs, quacks50 - even to a hypnotist. He had told them, 'I feel like hell. I sleep badly. I eat practically nothing. I drink too much and my work has gone to blazes. I'm shot to pieces. Make me better.' And each man had taken his blood pressure, a specimen51 of his urine, listened to his heart and chest, asked him questions he had answered truthfully, and had told him there was nothing basically wrong with him. Then he had paid his five guineas and gone off to John Bell and Croyden to have the new lot of prescriptions52 -for tranquillizers, sleeping pills, energizers - made up. And now he had just come from breaking off relations with the last resort - the hypnotist, whose basic message had been that he must go out and regain53 his manhood by having a woman. As if he hadn't tried that! The ones who had told him to take it easy up the stairs. The ones who had asked him to take them to Paris. The ones who had inquired indifferently, 'Feeling better now, dearie?' The hypnotist hadn't been a bad chap. Rather a bore about how he could take away warts54 and how he was persecuted55 by the BMA, but Bond had finally had enough of sitting in a chair and listening to the quietly droning voice while, as instructed, he relaxed and gazed at a naked electric light bulb. And now he had thrown up the fifty-guinea course after only half the treatment and had come to sit in this secluded56 garden before going back to his office ten minutes away across the park.
He looked at his watch. Just after three o'clock, and he was due back at two-thirty. What the hell! God, it was hot. He wiped a hand across his forehead and then down the side of his trousers. He used not to sweat like this. The weather must be changing. Atomic bomb, whatever the scientists might say to the contrary. It would be good to be down somewhere in the South of France. Somewhere to bathe whenever he wanted. But he had had his leave for the year. That ghastly month they had given him after Tracy. Then he had gone to Jamaica. And what hell that had been. No! Bathing wasn't the answer. It was all right here, really. Lovely roses to look at. They smelled good and it was pleasant looking at them and listening to the faraway traffic. Nice hum of bees. The way they went around the flowers, doing their work for their queen. Must read that book about them by the Belgian chap, Metternich or something. Same man who wrote about the ants. Extraordinary purpose in life. They didn't have troubles. Just lived and died. Did what they were supposed to do and then dropped dead. Why didn't one see a lot of bees' corpses57 around? Ants' corpses? Thousands, millions of them must die every day. Perhaps the others ate them. Oh, well! Better go back to the office and get hell from Mary. She was a darling. She was right to nag58 at him as she did. She was his conscience. But she didn't realize the troubles he had. What troubles? Oh well. Don't let's go into that! James Bond got to his feet and went over and read the lead labels of the roses he had been gazing at. They told him that the bright vermilion ones were 'Super Star' and the white ones 'Iceberg59'.
Then, with a jumble60 of his health, the heat, and the corpses of bees revolving61 lazily round his mind, James Bond strolled off in the direction of the tall grey building whose upper storeys showed themselves above the trees.
It was three thirty. Only two more hours to go before his next drink
The lift man, resting the stump62 of his right arm on the operating handle, said, 'Your secretary's in a bit of a flap, sir. Been asking everywhere for you.'
'Thank you, Sergeant63.'
He got the same message when he stepped out at the fifth floor and showed his pass to the security guard at the desk. He walked unhurriedly along the quiet corridor to the group of end rooms whose outer door bore the Double-O sign. He went through and along to the door marked 007. He closed it behind him. Mary Goodnight looked up at him and said calmly, 'M. wants you. He rang down half an hour ago.'
'Who's M.?'
Mary Goodnight jumped to her feet, her eyes flashing. 'Oh for God's sake, James, snap out of it! Here, your tie's crooked64.' She-came up to him and he docilely65 allowed her to pull it straight. 'And your hair's all over the place. Here, use my comb.' Bond took the comb and ran it absent-mindedly through his hair. He said, 'You're a good girl, Goodnight.' He fingered his chin. 'Suppose you haven't got your razor handy? Must look my best on the scaffold.'
'Please, James.' Her eyes were bright. 'Go and get on to him. He hasn't talked to you for weeks. Perhaps it's something important. Something exciting.' She tried desperately to put encouragement into her voice.
'It's always exciting starting a new life. Anyway, who's afraid of the Big Bad M.? Will you come and lend a hand on my chicken farm?'
She turned away and put her hands up to her face. He patted her casually66 on the shoulder and walked through into his office and went over and picked up the red telephone. '007 here, sir.'
'I'm sorry, sir. Had to go to the dentist.'
'I know, sir. I'm sorry. I left it in my desk.'
'Yes, sir.'
He put the receiver down slowly. He looked round his office as if saying goodbye to it, walked out and along the corridor and went up in the lift with the resignation of a man under sentence.
Miss Moneypenny looked up at him with ill-concealed hostility67. 'You can go in.' ?
Bond squared his shoulders and looked at the padded door behind which he had so often heard his fate pronounced. Almost as if it were going to give him an electric shock, he tentatively reached out for the door handle and walked through and closed the door behind him.
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1
superannuated
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| adj.老朽的，退休的；v.因落后于时代而废除，勒令退学 | |
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squires
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| n.地主，乡绅( squire的名词复数 ) | |
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wilderness
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| n.杳无人烟的一片陆地、水等，荒漠 | |
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trout
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| n.鳟鱼；鲑鱼(属) | |
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retired
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| adj.隐退的，退休的，退役的 | |
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hovered
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| 鸟( hover的过去式和过去分词 )； 靠近（某事物）； （人）徘徊； 犹豫 | |
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bent
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| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
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eyebrow
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| n.眉毛，眉 | |
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streak
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| n.条理，斑纹，倾向，少许，痕迹；v.加条纹，变成条纹，奔驰，快速移动 | |
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10
punctured
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| v.在（某物）上穿孔( puncture的过去式和过去分词 )；刺穿（某物）；削弱（某人的傲气、信心等）；泄某人的气 | |
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sip
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| v.小口地喝，抿，呷；n.一小口的量 | |
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corrugated
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| adj.波纹的；缩成皱纹的；波纹面的；波纹状的v.（使某物）起皱褶(corrugate的过去式和过去分词) | |
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irony
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| n.反语，冷嘲；具有讽刺意味的事，嘲弄 | |
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vaguely
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| adv.含糊地，暖昧地 | |
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puffs
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| n.吸( puff的名词复数 )；（烟斗或香烟的）一吸；一缕（烟、蒸汽等）；（呼吸或风的）呼v.使喷出( puff的第三人称单数 )；喷着汽（或烟）移动；吹嘘；吹捧 | |
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16
intrigued
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| adj.好奇的，被迷住了的v.搞阴谋诡计(intrigue的过去式)；激起…的兴趣或好奇心；“intrigue”的过去式和过去分词 | |
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diplomat
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| n.外交官，外交家；能交际的人，圆滑的人 | |
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skimps
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| v.少用( skimp的第三人称单数 )；少给；克扣；节省 | |
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gambling
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| n.赌博；投机 | |
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pointed
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| adj.尖的，直截了当的 | |
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zest
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| n.乐趣；滋味，风味；兴趣 | |
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aggravated
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| 使恶化( aggravate的过去式和过去分词 )； 使更严重； 激怒； 使恼火 | |
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lug
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| n.柄，突出部，螺帽；(英）耳朵；（俚）笨蛋；vt.拖，拉，用力拖动 | |
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forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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remains
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| n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹 | |
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miseries
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| n.痛苦( misery的名词复数 )；痛苦的事；穷困；常发牢骚的人 | |
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drearily
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| 沉寂地，厌倦地，可怕地 | |
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28
bungled
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| v.搞糟，完不成( bungle的过去式和过去分词 )；笨手笨脚地做；失败；完不成 | |
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brutally
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| adv.残忍地，野蛮地，冷酷无情地 | |
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incurable
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| adj.不能医治的，不能矫正的，无救的；n.不治的病人，无救的人 | |
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honourable
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| adj.可敬的；荣誉的，光荣的 | |
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32
puffed
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| adj.疏松的v.使喷出( puff的过去式和过去分词 )；喷着汽（或烟）移动；吹嘘；吹捧 | |
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countless
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| adj.无数的，多得不计其数的 | |
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neurotic
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| adj.神经病的，神经过敏的；n.神经过敏者，神经病患者 | |
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lesser
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| adj.次要的，较小的；adv.较小地，较少地 | |
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apparently
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| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
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assassination
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| n.暗杀；暗杀事件 | |
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ciphers
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| n.密码( cipher的名词复数 )；零；不重要的人；无价值的东西 | |
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desperately
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| adv.极度渴望地，绝望地，孤注一掷地 | |
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supreme
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| adj.极度的，最重要的；至高的，最高的 | |
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patriotic
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| adj.爱国的，有爱国心的 | |
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42
stinks
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| v.散发出恶臭( stink的第三人称单数 )；发臭味；名声臭；糟透 | |
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43
cartridge
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| n.弹壳，弹药筒；(装磁带等的)盒子 | |
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44
disconsolately
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| adv.悲伤地，愁闷地；哭丧着脸 | |
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gadget
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| n.小巧的机械，精巧的装置，小玩意儿 | |
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46
mandatory
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| adj.命令的；强制的；义务的；n.受托者 | |
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47
oblivious
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| adj.易忘的，遗忘的，忘却的，健忘的 | |
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48
hood
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| n.头巾，兜帽，覆盖；v.罩上，以头巾覆盖 | |
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49
convertible
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| adj.可改变的，可交换，同意义的；n.有活动摺篷的汽车 | |
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50
quacks
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| abbr.quacksalvers 庸医，骗子(16世纪习惯用水银或汞治疗梅毒的人)n.江湖医生( quack的名词复数 )；江湖郎中；（鸭子的）呱呱声v.（鸭子）发出嘎嘎声( quack的第三人称单数 ) | |
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51
specimen
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| n.样本，标本 | |
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52
prescriptions
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| 药( prescription的名词复数 )； 处方； 开处方； 计划 | |
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53
regain
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| vt.重新获得，收复，恢复 | |
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54
warts
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| n.疣( wart的名词复数 )；肉赘；树瘤；缺点 | |
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55
persecuted
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| （尤指宗教或政治信仰的）迫害(~sb. for sth.)( persecute的过去式和过去分词 )； 烦扰，困扰或骚扰某人 | |
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56
secluded
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| adj.与世隔绝的；隐退的；偏僻的v.使隔开，使隐退( seclude的过去式和过去分词) | |
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57
corpses
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| n.死尸，尸体( corpse的名词复数 ) | |
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58
nag
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| v.(对…)不停地唠叨；n.爱唠叨的人 | |
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iceberg
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| n.冰山，流冰，冷冰冰的人 | |
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60
jumble
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| vt.使混乱，混杂；n.混乱；杂乱的一堆 | |
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61
revolving
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| adj.旋转的，轮转式的；循环的v.（使）旋转( revolve的现在分词 )；细想 | |
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62
stump
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| n.残株，烟蒂，讲演台；v.砍断，蹒跚而走 | |
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63
sergeant
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| n.警官，中士 | |
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64
crooked
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| adj.弯曲的；不诚实的，狡猾的，不正当的 | |
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docilely
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| adv.容易教地，易驾驶地，驯服地 | |
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casually
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| adv.漠不关心地，无动于衷地，不负责任地 | |
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hostility
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| n.敌对，敌意；抵制［pl.］交战，战争 | |
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